Continental - Official Sponsor for UEFA EURO 2012

Hanover/Nyon, October 19, 2011. Continental AG announced today that it would play an active role as exclusive partner and Official Sponsor for UEFA EURO 2012TM in Poland and Ukraine as well as UEFA EURO 2016 TM in France. This allows Europe’s market leader in passenger tyres to take the next logical step in the very successful football-as-communi-cations-platform strategy initiated in 1995. It also enables Continental to continue to play an active role in Europe‘s key sport events while at the same time laying the groundwork for the upcoming years.

“After the great experience with UEFA EURO 2008 in Austria and Switzerland, we intend to bolster our top market position in Europe by means of these two exclusive sponsoring agreements. Our goals remain unchanged: to increase international brand awareness of the premium Continental brand; to further intensify the emotive element in and distinctiveness of our brand image with respect to safety and braking performance; and to boost sales of premium Continental brand tyres over the long run. The image attributes – passion, precision and the kind of team spirit expressed so well especially during the world's best football tournaments – match up perfectly with our premium brand and to the Continental company as a whole,” explained Nikolai Setzer, Executive Board member for the Tire division.

“It is great to be able to welcome Continental back in the UEFA EURO sponsor family. Continental has been an active supporter of the game of football for many years. Having a global, broadly based and trusted company like Continental as a UEFA EURO 2012™ and 2016™ Sponsor is a great asset for UEFA and we are honoured to welcome them on board,” said Guy-Laurent Epstein, UEFA Marketing Director. “We look forward to working closely with Continental on our shared mission of making both EURO 2012™ and EURO 2016™ exciting and memorable events.”

In the past fifteen years, Continental has used its exclusive sponsorship in international pro football to successfully set itself off from the competition. It has established a unique position for the brand image and rigorously integrated its international sponsoring activities into its relations with customers. That has really paid off: Since 2003, the premium Continental tyre brand has been able to continuously record growth rates in terms of brand awareness in the European key markets. “Needless to say, our sponsoring strategy is geared to further enhancing awareness of our brand – not just in the countries hosting the tournament. The world’s second biggest football tournament attracts a lot of attention globally; both in the strategically important growth markets in Eastern Europe, as well as in Asia and South America," adds Setzer. As part of a special investment program with a volume of over a billion euros, Continental is building up new tyre production capacities in Russia, China, Brazil, India and the U.S. In so doing, the leading European tyre manufacturer is providing back-up for its established locations in Germany, France, Portugal, Slovakia, Romania and the Czech Republic and paving the way to planned future growth.

Continental tightly embeds all activation measures for international football sponsoring in its overall strategy. This focuses on improving road safety by offering products with especially good braking performance. Continental makes use of the sponsoring experience gained in the past years to develop an activation concept suited to the conditions prevailing where the next major event takes place. The basis for this takes the form of promotional communication – with winter and summer advertising campaigns on TV, in print media and online – along-side banner advertising at all UEFA EURO matches. Moreover, exclusive use of match tickets for business partners and end consumers offers attractive possibilities for ticket promotions. Continental applies this option in individualised fashion in the various markets. For more information on Continental's football involvment www.ContiSoccerWorld.com has exclusive background reports on the stars, teams, trainers and host countries as well as other football news.